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Your favorite album based on the lyrics?

What's your favorite Dream Theater album if you were to choose it from how good the lyrics are, in your opinion? My favorite is Awake. Some songs are just so filled with emotion, like Space Dye Vest, Scarred, Innocence Faded and The Mirror, there's Lifting Shadows of a Dream which is, for me, pure poetry, and so on. Which one is the best, lyrically, in your opinion?

What's your favorite Dream Theater album if you were to choose it from how good the lyrics are, in your opinion? My favorite is Awake. Some songs are just so filled with emotion, like Space Dye Vest, Scarred, Innocence Faded and The Mirror, there's Lifting Shadows of a Dream which is, for me, pure poetry, and so on. Which one is the best, lyrically, in your opinion?

[quote=Soulfire][quote=Obryn]"Beneath the surface"! WOW! I feel like I'm listening to the soundtrack of a musical like "Les Miserables" with these tracks. Very powerful and uplifting![/quote]

How can you find Beneath the Surface uplifting? That song is so depressing lol![/quote]

Yeah, it is very weird. The music of both "Beneath the Surface" and "Far from Heaven" has this uplifting quality about it but the lyrics are really about loss. I guess it is uplifting because I have felt as the main character does at times and it is inspiring to know someone else has been there...

Scenes From a Memory for sure (based specifically on the complex storyline and recurring themes that is). To me that album is the most lyrically driven because of certain individual concepts that are alluded to again and again, like reincarnation and transcendence. ("what we have been is what we are", etc.)

Lyricswise I find BC&SL really poor, specially ANTR and TCOT, songs that are musically excellent but whose lyrics border in sillyness. I think JP was quite uninspired, and Wither tells about it. Maybe they should have allowed James and JM to contribute.

Anyway, regarding my favorite DT lyrics, they are on I&W and Awake.

Oh, and ADTOE has great lyrics too. Bridges in the Sky really touches me!

1. Scenes from a Memory: from the perspective of someone who went to school to study poetry, this album is lyrically amazing.
2. BC&SL: some great stories here- Nightmare, Shattered Fortress
3. ADToE: the softer songs really show off some great lyrical feats! Especially JL's "Far from Heaven" and "Beneath the surface"! WOW! I feel like I'm listening to the soundtrack of a musical like "Les Miserables" with these tracks. Very powerful and uplifting!

BCSL had good lyrics, but they aren't as deep as anything KM did. Kevin's lyrics are incredible, I love his use of metaphor. If anyone here listens to OSI you'll know what I'm talking about. So while BCSL's lyrics are good (I love A Nightmare to Remember and The Count of Tuscany) Awake is better.

Scenes From A Memory, as the lyrics tell quite a complex story, plus they fit into very complex song structures.
I'm surprised more people haven't mentioned BCSL, as definitely four out of those six songs have strong lyrical story arcs to them, Nightmare To Remember, Shattered Fortress, Best Of Times and Count Of Tuscany.

Hi everyone :)
I think all of their albums have some great lyrics ...but with A Dramatic Turn Of Events I immediately felt the depht of the songs, from the epic Breaking All Illusions to the softer Beneath The Surface (I admit I cried when I heard it the first time :P)...however my favourite song is Outcry, because its words reflect perfectly what is going on in some parts of the world, and what will probably happen in the future.